Freedom is a Tiny Desert Bird

I brush away some rough stones, making a small clearing for me to sit. 

Though my feet are sore and raw from walking barefoot in Israel’s desert, I am happy to be exactly where I am: smack in the middle of nowhere.

I’m in my “festival mode“– no worries, no problems, just presence, all love.

The four of us sit under the hot sun, sharing stories and singing familiar songs.

“I’d rather be a [….. ] than a snail. Yes I would, if I could, I surely would…” Sings my friend, Adi. I smile, remembering the harmonic Simon and Garfunkel melody that takes me back to long car rides through the suburbs of New York.

“What’s that missing word, Leora? I can’t remember.” Adi asks.

I scratch my head, racking my brain for the answer.

“Well I guess we can look it up – Rabbi Google always knows.” I say as I whip out my trusty iPhone friend.

In less than 20 seconds the answers appears before me on a 2 x 4 inch screen:

I’d rather be a sparrow than a snail.

I let out a gentle chuckle, finding beauty in the small gift of being reminded of my late sister, Annie, who went by the name “Sparrow.”

I am transported back to 2008, when in the middle of that same desert—near  the large crater at Mizpe Ramon—I lead a memorial ceremony for Annie on the anniversary of her passing, August 5. It is nighttime, and thousands of stars sprinkle the ebony sky. Candles flicker in her memory while her voice fills the empty desert with a transcendent beauty. I am there, right there with her eternal spirit, feeling her presence like a warm hug.

Then, almost 8 years later, returning to the same desert—this time, as a permanent resident of Israel—I feel her presence again so close.

I am curious: “How do you say Sparrow in Hebrew?” I ask.

“Dror,” Adi replies. “It also means ‘free.’”

How fitting, I think. 

Annie: a free spirit, once chained by gravity and belongings and things that hurt, now eternally free.

Perhaps it’s a “coincidence” that I hear the word dror repeatedly throughout my time at the festival.

A coincidence—like that tiny sparrow that landed on my sisters’ grave at my grandpas funeral; like the chance that the only plot left for my grandpa—In the entire Jewish section of the cemetery—would be right across from my sister.

I believe the world is held up by these coincidences, or some might say, miracles.

Sometimes they sneak up on you, and sometimes they pursue you.

Sometimes it is the stranger holding a door, a smile at the checkout line, the crystals forming on an icy windowsill or a baby’s first crawls and falls.

Sometimes it’s that missing song lyric—the one that reminds you of what freedom really is.